Images of Güines

El Primo (The First One or The Cousin) Café located on Máximo Gómez Street at the beginning of Trujillo Street, whose owner was the Spaniard Primo García. His nephew José Galdós, inherited it, who, later on, sold it to its succeeding owner…

Melitón Goyriena’s cart making shop located in the corner of Habana and Masó Streets. Melitón (a Catalonian) was married to Agustina Simeón and had two children: José Ángel and Gerardito…

The long-winded speeches and conferences that the distinguished Black speaker Norberto Bello used to deliver…

You really have to be an old Güinero if you remember that many of the carrousels and merry-go-rounds that would make us kids crazy, were placed in the lot of Real and Cuatro Palmas Streets (Four Palms) (thereafter being named Máximo Gómez and Gras Streets) where the clothing store El Heraldo (The Herald) was originally located and later on El Globo (The Balloon or The Globe) café and restaurant…

When a group of us kids used to go every evening to Central Park to skate and the whole park belonged to us because we used to make “waves.” At that time, the park was divided in two by San Julián Street and we skated in the section in front of the church…

When the Old People’s Home was located in the building of the old Gas Meter (Gas Headquarters) when it was used in the Villa for public and private lighting…

When the Park’s lawn was looked after, carefully and painstakingly by Don Manuel Álvarez employed for such task by the Municipality. Don Manuel went daily to work and after it was done, he always returned rolling the lawn mower in front of him, of course it was a manual one. And those of us who lived in La Máquina de Arroz (The Rice Mill) neighborhood, knew that it was Don Manuel coming or going because of the noise of the mowing machine that he usually pushed in the middle of the street…

When in order to abate the dust in the Villa’s streets, the same were sprayed or sprinkled with a big iron water tank cart pulled by horses, as well as were those carts devoted to garbage collection…

When we kids that attended the American School (K.P.B.M.) used to go there in a bus pulled by a pair of horses and we argued for the right to be seated next to the driver’s seat whose name was Eduardo…

The three or four years where we were able to enjoy the stay in Güines of O’Hallorans Circus that competed favorably, on presentation and artistic troupe with Pubillones and Santos y Artigas circuses, that also visited us every year. Its owner was the restless Güinero Justico O’Hallorans…